Sunday, June 05, 2005

Reuven Koret, the publisher of Israel Insider and the guy who bravely told Daniel Pipes to stuff it when Pipes tried to secretly force Israel Insider to stop publishing Barry Chamish (and thus revealed that Pipes is a covert censor of views which he feels are unhelpful to the Zionist cause), is of the opinion that the AIPAC espionage investigation is simply the American way of putting pressure on American Jews to accept American foreign policy in the Middle East, which includes the 'Roadmap' and the necessity to eventually deal with the Palestinians. Koret believes that the whole AIPAC matter is just an FBI sting operation set up to put pressure on AIPAC, a view which cannot be right as we know that the FBI had been investigating AIPAC long before Larry Franklin came into the picture, and thus must have suspected high-level espionage years before it could come into anybody's head to use it to put a damper on AIPAC's current enthusiasms. Having said that, the fact that the FBI has been allowed to continue its investigation as long as it has, and is apparently able to reach right up to the top of AIPAC with its indictments, would clearly require approval from the highest levels of the American government. In other words, even if AIPAC had committed the worst treason imaginable (and I am certain that it has), we would never have heard of it unless the Bush Administration wanted to use it to send a message to American Jews that they are not quite as powerful as they think they are, and they can't assume constant support regardless of how radical a position they may want to take. AIPAC is allowed to appear powerful only as long as radical Zionism suits the American Establishment. If the Palestinians can make a case that the existence of a viable and just Palestinian state is in the interests of the American Powers That Be, and can make that case in the context of the current American disaster in Iraq and the corresponding erosion of perceived American power around the world (not to mention the fact that it was entirely Zionists and mostly Jews that led the United States into the disaster), AIPAC may suddenly appear not to be as all-powerful as it appears to be today. AIPAC had better enjoy the blow job from Nancy Pelosi (which has to go down as one of the most cravenly mendacious speeches in American history, and enough to make anyone despair of the Democrats ever becoming a party that anyone would want to vote for), as it may be a while before they get another one.